REGINA - The official opposition wasted no time slamming the Sask Party government’s management of the finances following news that the province is back in a deficit of $250.5 million.
“This government’s fiscal management is awful,” said Trent Wotherspoon, finance critic for the NDP, in speaking to reporters Monday about the government’s second quarter fiscal report.
“Their ability to project is awful, as is their propensity to waste dollars on pet projects, and basically stick Saskatchewan people then with the costs. We’ve seen time and time again the government miss the mark with their budget projections, and they’ve really taking in the a tax-and squander-approach sticking Saskatchewan people with the bill for so much of their mismanagement.
“And I think what’s really telling is that somehow this $1.3 billion correction snuck up as a surprise upon this Premier and the minister, and while we’re now launched into a deficit. Thus is a government that continues to waste hard-earned public dollars on extravagance# like the pavilion in Dubai, overpriced hotels, runaway cost associated with mismanaged IT projects, so much more. We know this story, we’ve seen it with this GTH land scandals, we’ve seen it with the bypass.”
Wotherspoon said to go from over a $1 billion surplus to a deficit, all while presiding over “waste of public dollars” on projects such as the Dubai pavilion, is “really what we ‘be seen from the Sask Party. And then time and time again, all we’ve seen them do is crank up costs on Saskatchewan families, taxes on Saskatchewan people, and squandering those harder dollars that people need. Those costs are real for Saskatchewan families that are facing such serious cost of living pressures.”
Opposition leader Carla Beck issued a statement in which she said Scott Moe has “lost all credibility when it comes to managing taxpayer dollars. Once again, they’ve squandered a boom.”
“They aren’t focused on the right priorities. They’re jetting off on a million-dollar trip to Dubai and massively overspending on MLA-owned motels.”
It was not only the NDP slamming the fiscal update. The Canadian Taxpayers Federation also weighed in with their criticism of the Saskatchewan government for failing to keep the books in balance.
“Taxpayers should be concerned about this fiscal update,” said Gage Haubrich, CTF Prairie Director, in a news release. “The government failed to prepare for a downturn and now taxpayers are paying for it.”
Harbrich states that the fiscal update “needs to be a wake-up call for the government to get spending down…Taxpayers can’t afford to have the government waste anymore of their money on debt interest charges.”
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